The state news agency QNA quoted Foreign Ministry official Ahmad al-Rumaihi as emphasizing "the need to provide safe havens in Syria and to impose no-fly zones to ensure the safety of civilians."

In the Lebanese capital, Beirut, EU foreign-policy chief Federica Mogherini said it was too early to comment on the U.S. plan for safe zones in Syria. The bloc "will consider plans when they come," she said.

In an interview with ABC News broadcast late on January 25, Trump said he would "absolutely do safe zones in Syria for the people," stressing that he decided on the plan after watching the European Union struggle with a major refugee crisis spawned in large part by the Syrian civil war.

"I think that Europe has made a tremendous mistake by allowing these millions of people to go into Germany and various other countries," Trump told ABC.

Trump indicated that he sees the establishment of safe zones in Syria as one way of stemming what he sees as a threat of terrorism from admitting refugees and other immigrants or visitors from Muslim countries into the United States.

U.S. media are reporting that an executive order on safe zones that Trump is readying will be issued in conjunction with separate orders halting all resettlement of refugees from Syria in the United States, and suspending U.S. visas for people from Syria, Iraq, Iran, and other select Muslim countries until an aggressive system of vetting is in place.

Reuters claims to have seen the draft executive order on safe zones.

It said the order requires the Pentagon and State Department to come up with a plan within 90 days "to provide safe areas in Syria and in the surrounding region in which Syrian nationals displaced from their homeland can await firm settlement such as repatriation or potential third-country resettlement."

Reuters and AP said the document gives no details on what would constitute a safe zone, exactly where they might be set up, and who would defend them.

While various U.S. politicians have raised the possibility of establishing safe zones in Syria, including Trump's Democratic opponent in the November presidential election, Hillary Clinton, former President Barack Obama resisted the proposal out of concern that it would pull the United States more deeply into the six-year-old civil war in Syria and possibly lead to clashes with Russian forces waging an air campaign there.

The clashes could occur if Trump chooses to enforce "no fly" restrictions over the safe zones he is planning.

Moreover, U.S. ground forces likely would also be needed to protect civilians in the zones, greatly increasing the cost of intervention both in terms of money spent and lives at risk.

U.S. military officials have long warned that the creation of no-fly or safe zones inside Syria would require far more resources than those already devoted to fighting against the Islamic State in Syria, and it would be difficult to ensure that militants do not infiltrate the zones amid the chaos of Syria's civil war.

While campaigning, Trump suggested that he would ask wealthy Persian Gulf states to help pay for such safe havens.

On Trump's broader anti-immigration plans, Reuters reported that Trump's draft executive order temporarily barring refugees from Syria and other countries unless they are persecuted religious minorities asserts that the measures are needed to "protect the American people from terrorist attacks by foreign nationals."

AP reported that the draft order says its purpose is to make sure anyone allowed to enter the United States doesn't "bear hostile attitudes toward our country and its founding principles."

"We cannot, and should not, admit into our country those who do not support the U.S. Constitution or those who place violent religious edicts over American law," Trump states in the order, according to AP.

Human rights groups denounced Trump's anti-immigrant plans.

"The president needs to know he's an absolute fool for fostering this kind of hostility in his first few days. This will inflame violence against Americans around the world," said Seth Kaper-Dale, a pastor at the Reformed Church of Highland Park, New Jersey, which he said helped resettle 28 refugee and asylum-seeking families in the state last year.

"Never before in our country's history have we purposely, as a matter of policy, imposed a ban on immigrants or refugees on the basis of religion," said Nihad Awad, executive director of the Council on American-Islamic Relations, calling it "a disturbing confirmation of Islamophobia" that was evident throughout Trump's presidential campaign.

"Actions to build a wall around us, criminalize a religion, and to strike fear in the heart of immigrants make Trump's America look more like a police state than the republic we truly are," said Wade Henderson, president of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights.

With reporting by ABC, Reuters, and AP

RFE/RL journalists report the news in 26 languages in 22 countries where a free press is banned by the government or not fully established. We provide what many people cannot get locally: uncensored news, responsible discussion, and open debate.